Conversations With Dead People.

This episode is difficult for me. It's difficult because I get WAY too emotionally involved in the lives and worlds of fictional people.
I cry a lot when I watch this.
I cry because of the whole Tara thing. Because Willow so sincerely believes that she's speaking to Tara, and then has her heart crushed all over again when she discovers it was all a ploy. Because if Tara really is watching over Willow in some form, which I believe she is, she's having to watch The First mock her and mock Willow and mock the relationship they had. And she can't do anything to stop it. Can't do anything to protect Willow.
I cry because Dawn DOESN'T really believe she's seeing her mom(in my interpretation, anyway). Somewhere deep down she knows this isn't right so it can't be real. But she needs so badly for it to be real, so she pretends that it is on a subconscious level. And it really is one of the most evil things of all time. Because she's being exploited into believing that the person who loves and wants to protect her most of all, doesn't. It's not fair to Dawn because she needs to know that Buffy will be there for her always. And it's not fair to Buffy because she already feels like she's treading on eggshells around Dawn, trying desperately to convince her that she truly does care about her. It gives me chills. It disturbs me.
But most of all I cry for Jonathan.
And this is the part most people probably wouldn't be able to understand. Why I care so much. But that kind of works, because the fact that no one cares about Jonathan as much as I do is kind of the point.
In high school, that was me. I sometimes fit into a very small, close-knit group of friends, but mostly I was the girl who was either thought of as strange and pathetic, or not thought of at all. By the reckoning of the greater population at my school, I was a repellent oddity or I was nothing. Even within my group of friends, I was kind of on the outer edges. I was shy, so I didn't have as much to contribute to the conversation. I had interests and hobbies the others couldn't relate to, so there was a measure of separation. Now, I'm not saying this just to whinge about how horrible my life in high school was. I'm saying it illustrate the parallels between Jonathan and me. The first time the connection hit me HARD was in Earshot, during the scene in which Buffy and Jonathan have their little heart-to-heart in the belltower. The things Buffy says are so true of me, too: I spent so much time worrying what people thought of me, and it didn't matter because they thought so much more of what people were thinking about them.
Anyway, so Jonathan graduates. He tries to make a name for himself. The "Superstar" spell turns out not to be the thing that'll get him that name, so he steps up to Warren's call. Very quickly, he realizes it's not right. But his life has to mean something, so instead of backing down he keeps going.
And somehow it all leads up to him reminiscing about high school moments before his death. Going back over every time the bad thing happened to him(which was often). Thinking of everyone who wronged him. Everyone who ignored him. And he comes to some sort of peace with it. Forgives them. Decides it won't matter in the long run what they thought of him or did to him, because he's got his whole life ahead of him.
Except for he doesn't.
^And THAT, ladies and gents, is why Jonathan's death is so damn painful for me. We went through a lot of the same stuff. But I have my whole long life to do other things. To make new friends, do better and more meaningful things, learn and grow and become a better and better version of me every day. At the end of my life, high school will be the tiniest of all tiny blips on the radar for me. I have that to look forward to. And that's exactly what Jonathan thought he had, and he did not. He never got to go on and fulfill any of that potential. So in the end, for him, high school kind of was the big picture. Those years of torment and neglect actually did make up a big, substantial chunk of his life. His life ended with him forgiving himself and everyone else for all of that horrible crap he went through, but he never got to experience any of the rewards that would inevitably have come out of that forgiveness.
And so I cry. A lot.
Andrew's part of it gets me, too, but I feel like going off on that tangent is a task for another day, another blog entry. Lots of confused, tangled up feelings there.

But uhmm so yeah... anyway... Jonathan. I loved him and I felt for him and I wish his death were not so widely overlooked. But I understand why it is, and that just strengthens the point.